Tara Fay Coleman
2023 grant amount: $15,000 over two years
This grant will support a self-directed residency for research, study of the printmaking process and the development of a new body of work.
Tara Fay Coleman says that as an artist, it has often been difficult to find opportunities that align with her approach to her practice, or offer a level of support that enables her to grow, learn new skills and receive guidance and development.
"I am someone who takes an anti-capitalist approach to art making, and I don’t prioritize artwork sales because I have no desire to align my creative process with labor," she says. "There is so much emphasis on the business side of being an artist, which I feel is rooted in white supremacy because it reinforces that idea of Black labor for profit, and often puts pressure on artists to go against their values in order to make money because there are so few opportunities to be able to make a living creating."
As an artist focused on making identity-based works, she says she is interested in the stillness of process and creation, and artmaking functioning as an opportunity to align closer with oneself and de-centering white supremacist systems.
"This grant will not only significantly enhance my creative process, but will also help me develop an entirely new skill set, as well as strengthening previous skills," she says. "It will also empower me to prioritize myself in a way that I have not been able to do previously, as someone who has been consistently under-resourced in the way of my artistic practice."
WEB: https://www.tarafaycoleman.com/
INSTAGRAM: instagram.com/mstarafay
FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/tara.f.coleman/
LINKEDIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tarafaycoleman/